Appreciate the thoughtful article. $TSYS appears to finally be turning the around operationally but having the activists involved should tend to accelerate the changes that are still needed. A couple perspectives from my analysis of TSYS:

1) IP is definitely not fully valued in the market cap but I'm not basing my investment decision on that changing any time soon. In my mind, the IP will be more appropriately valued in one of three ways which are not short term: Sale or breakup of company (highly unlikely), Improved growth where IP is strong driving up the "moat" value, monetization (per cc, slowing in C15). Investors should note that this value is real but unlikely to be embraced in the market cap in the short term.

2) The operating expense load for TSYS is not only too high, but not appropriately allocated based upon the business IMO, both of which provide opportunities for activism to create shareholder value. It was very unfortunate that the company missed the opportunity to generate synergies through acquisitions by consolidating some functions and cut costs. Now we see variable G&A (excl depr) at 14% when it should be closer to 5% for a well run fine-tuned operation. They have increased R&D spend which feels right given the number of investment initiatives they are involved in. S&M is not high enough IMO and I suspect is too heavily geared toward govt. Commercial success, especially in new markets such as connected cars, connected health will require marketing funds and a 7% spend rate all in is not adequate to take advantage of these opportunities. Getting total opex to under 30% while increasing S&M over 10% would feel far more compelling IMO.

3) The company still appears far too focused on govt segment as opposed to commercial. While govt is important for lots of reasons, the volatility and margins should work to refocus management on the growth opportunities in commercial segment to a larger degree.

Having said that, it appears pretty clear that this company is undervalued and is in the process of turning the corner. Thanks again for the article.

Sequenom's VisibiliT Has A Huge Opportunity In Replacing The First Trimester Screen [View article]

SQNM has consistently stated that approximately 8% of the US is self-pay. That data was based upon payment of hospital births. If the overall birth market is 8% self pay, it stands to reason that this percentage of the population that would self pay would increase when there is no coverage option available aside from a much less effective serum screen.

Sequenom Has Taken All The Right Steps To Reach Profitability [View article]

Sure thing. No computer acces today to more fully respond but some examples are:1) VisibiliT is not priced at $800. That is the list price. The ultimate price will be much lower. For reference purposes, MaterniT has a list of $2700 with an estimate average reimbursement of around $1000.

2) NIPT isn't a substitute for invasive procedures. It elimates the need for them if there is a negative test result. Biggest benefit of NIPT as roughly 97 percent of the results are negative

3) biosciences segment was actually profitable. It needed a lot of investment to grow which would have taken away from the larger diagnostic opportunity.

4) the IP purchase contributed to the opex savings but not quite as you described. The royalties are in COGS. The savings were primarily from reduced legal costs and the $2m reimbursement was a piece of it